About this site

This resource is hosted by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, but was compiled and authored by Padraig O’Malley. It is the product of almost two decades of research and includes analyses, chronologies, historical documents, and interviews from the apartheid and post-apartheid eras.

Bernstein, Lionel (Rusty)

1920 - 2002

Bernstein, an architect, was leader of the CPSA. He was a founder member and leader of the Congress of Democrats and a defendant in the Treason Trial and the Rivonia trial.

He joined the CPSA in 1939. He was on the editorial board of Fighting Talk until its demise in the early sixties. He played an important role in the drafting of the Freedom Charter in 1955 but was detained in 1960 and placed under house arrest until 1962. He was arrested at Rivonia in 1963 but was acquitted after the trial. Shortly after his acquittal he escaped from South Africa and settled in England.

This resource is hosted by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, but was compiled and authored by Padraig O’Malley. Return to theThis resource is hosted by the site.